"If there isn't a muse...MANY GENRES ONE CRAFT is surely the next best thing. The contributors know their stuff, and what they're teaching applies to writing at any age. MANY GENRES ONE CRAFT covers all the bases superbly, including issues I haven't seen addressed anywhere else in today's rapidly shifting publishing landscape."
--Renni Browne, co-author of SELF-EDITING FOR FICTION WRITERS

Tuesday, April 23, 2013

The most important part of making a career as a fiction author should be obvious: you have to write well and tell an engaging story. But if you've been writing and submitting for a while, you've no doubt realized that simply being a good writer isn't all there is to it. Luck seems to play a distressingly large role in the publishing process. But the funny thing is that writers who actively seek out writing opportunities generally seem to be "luckier" than those who don't.

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Lucy A. Snyder is the Bram Stoker Award-winning author of the novels Spellbent and Shotgun Sorceress and the collections Sparks and Shadows, Chimeric Machines, and Installing Linux on a Dead Badger. Her writing has also appeared in several magazines. She has a B.S. in biology, an M.A. in journalism and graduated from the 1995 Clarion Writers' Workshop. Since 2005, she's directed the Context Writing Workshops. She currently is a Seton Hill MFA mentor. Lucy was born in South Carolina, grew up in Texas, and now lives in Ohio, with her husband and occasional co-author Gary A. Braunbeck. For more information, please visit www.lucysnyder.com.

Wednesday, April 10, 2013

Read an excerpt from "Guerilla Marketing: The Reality of Selling Your Book" by Patrick J. Picciarelli in Many Genres, One Craft.

Times were when a writer sold his first book to a publisher he stayed with that same publisher for the rest of his writing career.

The publisher expected to lose money on the first book, but assumed because they had faith in the writer’s talent and his ability to acquire a readership, that the writer’s second book would break even, the third make some money, the fourth make a little more and so on. This was called “bringing up a writer.”

Of course those were the Good Old Days. In the publishing world, we’re talking about the late twentieth century.

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Patrick J. Picciarelli is the author of Jimmy the Wags: Street Stories of a Private Eye, My Life in the NYPD: Jimmy the Wags, Mala Femina: A Woman’s Life as the Daughter of a Don, and Blood Shot Eyes. “The Prince of Arthur Avenue” from the Bronx Noir anthology was made into a movie in 2010. Picciarelli, a former U.S. Army machine gunner in Vietnam, spent 20 years in the NYPD, retiring as a lieutenant. He is currently a licensed private investigator. He holds B.A. and M.A. degrees in Criminal Justice from John Jay College of Criminal Justice and an M.A. in Writing Popular Fiction from Seton Hill University, where he is now adjunct faculty.

If you've been waiting to submit your Science Fiction Adventure novel to Dog Star Books, Heidi will be taking pitches on Friday afternoon. Raw Dog Screaming Press will also be represented by Jennifer Barnes and John Edward Lawson at Pennwriters. Jennifer will be listening to pitches for RDSP's non-fiction imprint, Guide Dog Books, as well as appropriate fiction for the main line. John is interested in poetry collections and works of horror and dark fiction.

As many of you know, RDSP, by necessity, has a closed submissions policy for all its imprints, but the editors are happy to hear about your potential projects face-to-face at any of our literary events.

Thursday, April 4, 2013

Read an excerpt from "Successful Book Signings: The Personal Touch" by David J. Corwell in Many Genres, One Craft

Congratulations!

After months, perhaps years, of diligently working on your manuscript, you’ve finally found a publisher who believes in your work – or you’ve decided to publish it yourself. Your article/book/story has arrived, you’ve set up your first signing event (bookstore managers always welcome calls or visits to discuss such an opportunity), and you’ve even sent out announcements to family and friends, as well as press releases to the local media. Now, you’re sitting (hopefully) near the entrance of the bookstore, your work nicely displayed. But as the first potential reader walks through the door, your initial enthusiasm evaporates, replaced by an internal trembling and dry mouth. You suddenly ask yourself: What do I do next?

While book signings are one of the best ways to promote your work, not everyone you talk to will buy a book. Knowing what to expect ahead of time will not only help you develop a thicker skin when it comes to selling, but it may also give you a jump on how to turn a rejection into a sale. Here are the top ten “excuses” I’ve heard from potential readers when they’re clearly not interested in buying my book(s):

1. “I’ll be back/come back later.” As you casually observe, these people will go out of their way to “miss” your table as they leave the event.

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David J. Corwell’s stories appear in Cloaked in Shadow: Dark Tales of Elves (Fantasist Enterprises), Daily Flash: 365 Days of Flash Fiction (Pill Hill Press), Día de los Muertos (Elektrik Milk Bath Press), Voices of New Mexico (LPD Press/Rio Grande Books), and Tales of the Talisman (Hadrosaur Productions). He is an indefatigable promoter of his work, and his latest lineup of book signings can be found at http://booktour.com/author/david_j_corwell. David is also a 2006 graduate of the Seton Hill WPF program and the New Mexico sales rep for Fantasist Enterprises. He lives in Albuquerque with his beautiful wife and three daughters.